The TLA reading for yesterday (p. 89-92), the very end of the section we've been in, is so characteristically Briggs, I think. The idea of not just "taking seriously" but "embracing" the criticisms against Lowe-Porter and using them as a jumping-off point for the rest of the book is so great. She's "embracing" them in the sense of looking at them very closely, up close and personal, and seeing herself -- and Barthes! -- in them. She's taking them on and living them out. She is so willing to experiment and play and see where it takes her. I see similarities in the way her mind works and in how Barthes's does -- they both follow ideas as though going on an adventure, ready to see what new places they might travel to. And they find the most lovely, the most surprising places to start those adventures!
"They both follow ideas as though going on an adventure..."—beautifully put, and it feels so true. And they both invite us along as companions and peers. There does seem such affinity between KB and RB in terms of this and more... it makes me wonder about how KB was drawn to Barthes' work (she's talked about this some in TLA, and may talk about it more, though I can't remember how much detail she goes into?? We'll find out!). And it makes me think again of the idea of companion texts (she speaks about this beautifully in the Fitzcarraldo podcast)—texts that seem to *see* us, to invite us into relationship with them. It's a sort of love story!—finding the books that are like that for us—I think I am hungry for details about how KB and RB's work found each other...
The Fitzcarraldo podcast is another Briggs interview I'd love to re-listen to! Good question about how KB found RB -- we'll have to keep that question in mind as we read further, and maybe there are details in interviews we can find online. I'm not sure. Do you think KB would write a memoir for us?? :)
TLA, pl. 86-88: "It has to be possible to continue this inexhaustible work together: to query and vary each other's decisions, holding to or elaborating alternative measures of precision and care, without quarrelling, necessarily, or policing. And without shaming? This, it seems, is less clear."
I love the vision of what's possible here, where translation is a never-ending project of changing and correcting, but one done without arguing or shaming. It seems idealistic, in the best way -- holding up the prospect of how things can be, even if they currently are far from that way.
I'm also thinking about embarrassment: "Perhaps embarrassment is simply what comes -- what has to come -- with the territory of claiming to have written a translation." How much bravery it takes to make a new thing, a translation or any other new thing, and send it into the world. It will absolutely have mistakes in it. You will feel embarrassment. Can you/I do it anyway?
Barthes, Session of Feb. 3rd. Someone tweeted about how someone should create an illustrated edition of Barthes's asides and parentheses, and ever since I saw that, I've been noticing the parenthesis use, and it's frequently so, so interesting. I loved this aside from today: "(this is perhaps the best definition of Beauty: a scintillation between two Deaths.)" p. 55.
I think I'm following Barthes's argument just fine, doing well, and then I come across something that makes me wonder: "the mainspring of [Renard's] short form is the *impression* (altogether contrary to the haiku)." I would like a more detailed explanation, please! Is it that "impressions" are vague and hazy, and the haiku is sharp and clear? I'm not sure.
We finally get more Renard in the Feb 24 lecture. I have been wondering about this too! He refers to so much in his lectures but this one stood out as there wasn't an aside by him explaining what he meant or a footnote by Briggs. As far as I can tell, he loathes Renard for what he calls "conceit" or "affectation." And after reading the references (85), I get it. Renard's phrases are very studied--and in a kind of affected mannerism. NYRB has a book by Renard and I'm very curious to see if all his writing like that!
I'm so taken with the open-hearted, willing-to-be-vulnerable quality of Kate Briggs' writing. Here's this sentence from page 92 of TLA: "And there is this close involving time spent with the sentence she is working on (then, the great sequence of sentences) that the translator is not wrong—or, I can't see how exactly she is wrong; in no way straightforwardly or eventually wrong—to feel that she has written herself." That bit between the dashes, the way it's set off and the way it loops back on itself, on the idea of "wrongness," then moves forward again in a slightly different way—that all makes me feel like I can see the process of her thinking, like I'm invited into her brain in a way that feels so transparent and generous. And so very different from the proclaiming-from-a-mountaintop, assured and rigid stance of the critics she's writing about a few pages earlier, the ones dumping on Helen Lowe-Porter's work. I'm now thinking about Rebecca's post on embarrassment and the bravery it takes to make a new thing—yes! And the bravery it takes to be as vulnerable and open on the page as Briggs is, as "non-arrogant" (as she describes Barthes' tone).
Also, I'm just in love with the way she's going to take the criticisms leveled at Lowe-Porter and *use* them to explore her subject matter (p. 91). Instead of dismissing L-P, instead of siding with those critics and deciding further exploration isn't necessary, she's going to take up those criticisms and gently investigate them, fold them into her work.
I've read TLA before, but I don't think I noticed that the criticism she lists on p. 91 become the titles of subsequent chapters. Um ... I absolutely should not have missed that lol. Yes, using those criticisms as a starting point for deeper thought (not just to argue against, but to argue with and to explore) is wonderful.
What you wrote here makes me think about how TLA got one semi-famous harsh review (by Benjamin Moser), and I'm mad about it all over again, although when the book first came out, I wasn't aware of the controversy. But now when I think about it, I get mad. But Briggs, in talking about it with David Naimon on the Between the Covers podcast, focused on how other translators wrote in her defense and how many good things came out of the conversations that ensued. It was a very generous response!
I love your reading of the quotation in your comment.
Rebecca, you're not alone :). I also completely missed that on my first read of TLA! And oh, yes, I loved KB's response to that horrible review on Between the Covers—she embodies generosity in all sorts of ways. Makes me want to re-listen to that episode.
I loved that section on pages 91 and 92 too! it reminded of a phrase I came across while recently watching a Chinese historical drama, The Ingenious One. The phrase is "是,也不是" or "shi, ye bu shi" and it means "yes, but not yes" and it reminds what Briggs is doing in these passages, noting the criticisms and then going off into a different (and much more open and free) investigation and interpretation. She subverts their criticisms while using their own critiques as her jumping point.
I'll have to listen to her interview with Naimon but I better skip the Moser article if just to keep my blood pressure down!
Yes, but not yes... this feels just right, even the comma. It's such a fertile space! Open and free, as you said. Oh, and yup, the Moser review really unhelpful for keeping blood pressure down (but the response from the translators defending Briggs—which I think you can find online? I'll look for it—is so heartening).
I will definitely have to listen to the podcast with David Naimon! Looking forward to it. I have a train ride tomorrow so this will be excellent.
The funny part about translation "shi, ye bu shi" is that I had some choices in translating the phrase. A more literal translation would have been "yes, neither yes" or "yes, no yes." I went with "yes, but not yes" because I thought that conveyed the concept in English best.
When I think about translating a whole book from one language to another--well, my mind boggles. Of course one wants to gets to the closest English equivalent but there's also so much subjectivity going on too.
I am in awe of Briggs's translation of Barthes -- now that I'm reading the text, I can (barely) begin to imagine how difficult it was. So many choices! Such complex ideas and sentences! So many references and allusions! So many tonal shifts!
Same here. And Catherine, what you wrote is fascinating! My mind boggles, too—thinking of translating an entire book, when there are so many possibilities just within one phrase (btw, I'm also compelled by the idea of "yes, neither yes"!). As you said: so much subjectivity. Which makes the affinity we've talked about between Briggs and Barthes feel extra meaningful (now I'm trying, and failing, to imagine translating a text with which you don't feel any affinity... though in some ways, maybe that would be easier?).
Here Barthes continues the discourse on discussing the weather, which I enjoyed. Talking about the weather is used as shorthand for banal discourse, but Barthes reveals that there are reasons that we do this, , that in doing so, like with all language, we are communicating and not just filling time. ""the Weather prompts in us only this (minimal) discourse: that life is worth living."
He discusses the zen precept of fulling experience the world through an empty mind, although this is one of the few phenomena that he doesn't directly attribute to the Japanese: "the sensation of life, the feeling of being alive; and, as we know, if that feeling is to be pure, intense, glorious, perfect, a certain *void* has to form within the subject: even when the jubilation (of love), for example, is at its most intense it's because there's a language void within the subject: it's when language is silent, when there's no longer any commentary, interpretation, or meaning that existence is pure. " I am thinking of the zen guide _The Path to Aliveness_, which really showed me that zen meditation is not about an empty mind so that you can escape from the world, but rather so that you can be more fully in it by skipping over language directly to the sensations. The "void" is the absence of the inner critic, the commentary that we use to mediate our senses.
I honestly want to put this bit on my wall: "Poetry = practice of subtlety in a barbaric world." Our culture has lost its negative capability. We create a wall of language between us in the world and the only things that are allowed through are the bits that are easily reproducible, the verbal memes. The "culture wars"=a reduction of every part of our culture to good v. bad.
Thank you for that connection to zen and The Path to Aliveness. Your explanation makes total sense. Your point about the wall of language -- ouch. I think about my students who want to talk about literature in terms of cliche -- messages, lessons, morals, etc. I'm not as skilled as I would like in getting them to look deeper.
Briggs, pp81-85: What a great way of revealing how the big translators got to where they were by accident or in unexpected ways (including Briggs). Even so, Lowe-Porter “refused to send a translation to the publisher until she felt as though she had written the book herself.” (85)
My apologies for not getting back to you on the video conferencing. I would prefer to exempt myself at present if you don't mind. I am not that comfortable with social media and attempting to learn a new application intimidates me a bit. May I hold off until I gain familiarity with the program?
The TLA reading for yesterday (p. 89-92), the very end of the section we've been in, is so characteristically Briggs, I think. The idea of not just "taking seriously" but "embracing" the criticisms against Lowe-Porter and using them as a jumping-off point for the rest of the book is so great. She's "embracing" them in the sense of looking at them very closely, up close and personal, and seeing herself -- and Barthes! -- in them. She's taking them on and living them out. She is so willing to experiment and play and see where it takes her. I see similarities in the way her mind works and in how Barthes's does -- they both follow ideas as though going on an adventure, ready to see what new places they might travel to. And they find the most lovely, the most surprising places to start those adventures!
"They both follow ideas as though going on an adventure..."—beautifully put, and it feels so true. And they both invite us along as companions and peers. There does seem such affinity between KB and RB in terms of this and more... it makes me wonder about how KB was drawn to Barthes' work (she's talked about this some in TLA, and may talk about it more, though I can't remember how much detail she goes into?? We'll find out!). And it makes me think again of the idea of companion texts (she speaks about this beautifully in the Fitzcarraldo podcast)—texts that seem to *see* us, to invite us into relationship with them. It's a sort of love story!—finding the books that are like that for us—I think I am hungry for details about how KB and RB's work found each other...
The Fitzcarraldo podcast is another Briggs interview I'd love to re-listen to! Good question about how KB found RB -- we'll have to keep that question in mind as we read further, and maybe there are details in interviews we can find online. I'm not sure. Do you think KB would write a memoir for us?? :)
I think we should specially request one! :)
TLA, pl. 86-88: "It has to be possible to continue this inexhaustible work together: to query and vary each other's decisions, holding to or elaborating alternative measures of precision and care, without quarrelling, necessarily, or policing. And without shaming? This, it seems, is less clear."
I love the vision of what's possible here, where translation is a never-ending project of changing and correcting, but one done without arguing or shaming. It seems idealistic, in the best way -- holding up the prospect of how things can be, even if they currently are far from that way.
I'm also thinking about embarrassment: "Perhaps embarrassment is simply what comes -- what has to come -- with the territory of claiming to have written a translation." How much bravery it takes to make a new thing, a translation or any other new thing, and send it into the world. It will absolutely have mistakes in it. You will feel embarrassment. Can you/I do it anyway?
That part was terrifying!
Barthes, Session of Feb. 3rd. Someone tweeted about how someone should create an illustrated edition of Barthes's asides and parentheses, and ever since I saw that, I've been noticing the parenthesis use, and it's frequently so, so interesting. I loved this aside from today: "(this is perhaps the best definition of Beauty: a scintillation between two Deaths.)" p. 55.
I think I'm following Barthes's argument just fine, doing well, and then I come across something that makes me wonder: "the mainspring of [Renard's] short form is the *impression* (altogether contrary to the haiku)." I would like a more detailed explanation, please! Is it that "impressions" are vague and hazy, and the haiku is sharp and clear? I'm not sure.
We finally get more Renard in the Feb 24 lecture. I have been wondering about this too! He refers to so much in his lectures but this one stood out as there wasn't an aside by him explaining what he meant or a footnote by Briggs. As far as I can tell, he loathes Renard for what he calls "conceit" or "affectation." And after reading the references (85), I get it. Renard's phrases are very studied--and in a kind of affected mannerism. NYRB has a book by Renard and I'm very curious to see if all his writing like that!
Googling something that Barthes mentioned led me to this blog about Haiku: https://thehaikuexperiment.wordpress.com/
The most recent entry is about how early translators of haiku made choices that led to the association in the West with haiku and minimalism.
Thank you, Sara! Into the newsletter this will go.
I'm so taken with the open-hearted, willing-to-be-vulnerable quality of Kate Briggs' writing. Here's this sentence from page 92 of TLA: "And there is this close involving time spent with the sentence she is working on (then, the great sequence of sentences) that the translator is not wrong—or, I can't see how exactly she is wrong; in no way straightforwardly or eventually wrong—to feel that she has written herself." That bit between the dashes, the way it's set off and the way it loops back on itself, on the idea of "wrongness," then moves forward again in a slightly different way—that all makes me feel like I can see the process of her thinking, like I'm invited into her brain in a way that feels so transparent and generous. And so very different from the proclaiming-from-a-mountaintop, assured and rigid stance of the critics she's writing about a few pages earlier, the ones dumping on Helen Lowe-Porter's work. I'm now thinking about Rebecca's post on embarrassment and the bravery it takes to make a new thing—yes! And the bravery it takes to be as vulnerable and open on the page as Briggs is, as "non-arrogant" (as she describes Barthes' tone).
Also, I'm just in love with the way she's going to take the criticisms leveled at Lowe-Porter and *use* them to explore her subject matter (p. 91). Instead of dismissing L-P, instead of siding with those critics and deciding further exploration isn't necessary, she's going to take up those criticisms and gently investigate them, fold them into her work.
I've read TLA before, but I don't think I noticed that the criticism she lists on p. 91 become the titles of subsequent chapters. Um ... I absolutely should not have missed that lol. Yes, using those criticisms as a starting point for deeper thought (not just to argue against, but to argue with and to explore) is wonderful.
What you wrote here makes me think about how TLA got one semi-famous harsh review (by Benjamin Moser), and I'm mad about it all over again, although when the book first came out, I wasn't aware of the controversy. But now when I think about it, I get mad. But Briggs, in talking about it with David Naimon on the Between the Covers podcast, focused on how other translators wrote in her defense and how many good things came out of the conversations that ensued. It was a very generous response!
I love your reading of the quotation in your comment.
Rebecca, you're not alone :). I also completely missed that on my first read of TLA! And oh, yes, I loved KB's response to that horrible review on Between the Covers—she embodies generosity in all sorts of ways. Makes me want to re-listen to that episode.
Me too! I actually listened to the episode twice, the second time immediately after the first. I plan to listen again as well.
I cannot find that episode. Do you have a link?
Here you go! https://tinhouse.com/podcast/kate-briggs-the-long-form/
I loved that section on pages 91 and 92 too! it reminded of a phrase I came across while recently watching a Chinese historical drama, The Ingenious One. The phrase is "是,也不是" or "shi, ye bu shi" and it means "yes, but not yes" and it reminds what Briggs is doing in these passages, noting the criticisms and then going off into a different (and much more open and free) investigation and interpretation. She subverts their criticisms while using their own critiques as her jumping point.
I'll have to listen to her interview with Naimon but I better skip the Moser article if just to keep my blood pressure down!
I love this! I feel like I could use this approach in my classroom...
Yes, but not yes... this feels just right, even the comma. It's such a fertile space! Open and free, as you said. Oh, and yup, the Moser review really unhelpful for keeping blood pressure down (but the response from the translators defending Briggs—which I think you can find online? I'll look for it—is so heartening).
I will definitely have to listen to the podcast with David Naimon! Looking forward to it. I have a train ride tomorrow so this will be excellent.
The funny part about translation "shi, ye bu shi" is that I had some choices in translating the phrase. A more literal translation would have been "yes, neither yes" or "yes, no yes." I went with "yes, but not yes" because I thought that conveyed the concept in English best.
When I think about translating a whole book from one language to another--well, my mind boggles. Of course one wants to gets to the closest English equivalent but there's also so much subjectivity going on too.
I am in awe of Briggs's translation of Barthes -- now that I'm reading the text, I can (barely) begin to imagine how difficult it was. So many choices! Such complex ideas and sentences! So many references and allusions! So many tonal shifts!
Same here. And Catherine, what you wrote is fascinating! My mind boggles, too—thinking of translating an entire book, when there are so many possibilities just within one phrase (btw, I'm also compelled by the idea of "yes, neither yes"!). As you said: so much subjectivity. Which makes the affinity we've talked about between Briggs and Barthes feel extra meaningful (now I'm trying, and failing, to imagine translating a text with which you don't feel any affinity... though in some ways, maybe that would be easier?).
Here Barthes continues the discourse on discussing the weather, which I enjoyed. Talking about the weather is used as shorthand for banal discourse, but Barthes reveals that there are reasons that we do this, , that in doing so, like with all language, we are communicating and not just filling time. ""the Weather prompts in us only this (minimal) discourse: that life is worth living."
He discusses the zen precept of fulling experience the world through an empty mind, although this is one of the few phenomena that he doesn't directly attribute to the Japanese: "the sensation of life, the feeling of being alive; and, as we know, if that feeling is to be pure, intense, glorious, perfect, a certain *void* has to form within the subject: even when the jubilation (of love), for example, is at its most intense it's because there's a language void within the subject: it's when language is silent, when there's no longer any commentary, interpretation, or meaning that existence is pure. " I am thinking of the zen guide _The Path to Aliveness_, which really showed me that zen meditation is not about an empty mind so that you can escape from the world, but rather so that you can be more fully in it by skipping over language directly to the sensations. The "void" is the absence of the inner critic, the commentary that we use to mediate our senses.
I honestly want to put this bit on my wall: "Poetry = practice of subtlety in a barbaric world." Our culture has lost its negative capability. We create a wall of language between us in the world and the only things that are allowed through are the bits that are easily reproducible, the verbal memes. The "culture wars"=a reduction of every part of our culture to good v. bad.
Thank you for that connection to zen and The Path to Aliveness. Your explanation makes total sense. Your point about the wall of language -- ouch. I think about my students who want to talk about literature in terms of cliche -- messages, lessons, morals, etc. I'm not as skilled as I would like in getting them to look deeper.
Briggs, pp81-85: What a great way of revealing how the big translators got to where they were by accident or in unexpected ways (including Briggs). Even so, Lowe-Porter “refused to send a translation to the publisher until she felt as though she had written the book herself.” (85)
My apologies for not getting back to you on the video conferencing. I would prefer to exempt myself at present if you don't mind. I am not that comfortable with social media and attempting to learn a new application intimidates me a bit. May I hold off until I gain familiarity with the program?
Absolutely! We want people to participate only in the ways they want to and at the level they are comfortable with. That's totally fine!